When looking at stakeholders many people don't look at the people that aren't directly apart of the controversy but are in fact affected by the controversy. In this case I am talking about the local towns and communities that would be located along or near the pipeline. These are generally small towns in sparsely populated regions of the midwest, particularly Montana, the Dakotas, and Iowa. These towns are not solidified in their view on the pipeline. Many like the pipeline and the added economic boom it could bring to their small towns, meanwhile other towns are afraid of the potential dangers of a pipeline going through or near their community and their agricultural livelihoods. These towns are physical locations and are collections of people with different ideas and different feelings about the pipeline. These towns are represented by their local governments, whether that be a council or a mayor. The Keystone Pipeline would have adverse affects for good and for bad within each town. It is up to the local mayor or council to decide whether they are going to let the pipeline go through their town. In other words, these local towns are directly affected by the pipeline controversy and to them it isn't just a bill on a piece of paper, to them this pipeline is do or die and tied directly to life as they know it.
One claim these towns have made is that the pipeline will detrimentally affect their way of life. One Nebraska town wants the pipeline to go around their town because of fears that it will affect their water supply "Cindy Myers, a nurse who lives 10 miles outside of Atkinson and a couple miles from the proposed pipeline route, is taking Thursday off so she can line up early. Local landowners are desperate to be heard, she said, because they worry that oil from the pipeline could leak into the Ogallala aquifer and contaminate their water wells. Like many landowners, Myers wants the pipeline rerouted out of the sandhills." Another claim that towns have made is that without the pipeline their entire town will die "If there is no pipeline, there is no future,” said Denny Hogan, the commander of VFW Post 4813. “End of conversation."" Another claim made by one of these small towns is that it will take away the livelihoods of many local farmers and thus take away the livelihood of the community. One Nebraska opinion piece wrote " we’ve heard directly from family farmers whose farms lie in the proposed path of the Keystone XL Pipeline. Many of these farms have been in the same family for generations. Now the Keystone XL Pipeline jeopardizes the health and viability of that land, rather than ensuring its health for future generations." Essentially many local farmers are worried that they will lose what has been getting their families by for generations: their land.
These claims are fairly well founded. The most important thing to a small town is survival. For these towns, survival is found either in inviting the pipeline in or telling the pipeline to stay away. These towns try to just stay alive by any means necessary, for many of these towns that means defending their farming and land from the incursion of big oil companies. Other towns have watched their farming and agricultural businesses fail and the town dry up as seen by the small Montana town. To these towns, the pipeline will be a savior and potentially reinvigorate their town.
Small towns in America are one of the more important yet forgot about stakeholders in this controversy. These towns are directly affected for better or for worse by the construction of this pipeline. Unlike the big oil companies, these towns have everything to gain or to lose from the pipeline and unlike the environmentalist groups, this pipeline isn't about the big picture but rather about everyday life. In that way these towns can be considered in both groups because some support the pipeline while some reject it.
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| Ian Britton, "Beatty, Nevada" via FreeFoto.com CCO licence |
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